CHRISTCHURCH, New Zealand — Fresh aftershocks sent masonry tumbling among rescuers in New Zealand's quake zone and a cat sparked false alarms Saturday of a possible survivor, as the disaster's death toll rose to 145 with more than 200 missing.

Grim assessments emerged for the fate of the central business district in devastated Christchurch, with engineers and planners saying it will be unusable for months and that about a third of the buildings must be destroyed and rebuilt.

On the outer edge of the district, Brent Smith watched in tears as workers demolished his 1850s-era house, where he had run a bed and breakfast and where antique jugs and a $6,000 Victorian bed were reduced to shards and firewood. His three daughters hugged him, also weeping.

"You don't know whether to laugh or cry but I've been doing more of the latter," Smith said.

Prime Minister John Key, who spent some of the afternoon speaking to families who lost loved ones in the disaster, called on all New Zealanders to hold two minutes of silence next Tuesday to remember victims and the ordeal of the survivors.

"This may be New Zealand's single-most tragic event," Key said.

Key said the government would announce an aid package Monday for an estimated 50,000 people who will be out of work for months due to the closure of downtown.

Christchurch Mayor Bob Parker assured relatives of the missing — including people from several countries who have converged on this southern New Zealand city of 350,000— that every effort was being made to locate any remaining survivors.

No one was found alive overnight as a multinational team of more than 600 rescuers continued scouring the city's central business district, although a paramedic reported hearing voices in one destroyed building early Saturday, Police Superintendent Russel Gibson said.

"We mobilized a significant number of people and sent a dog in again — and a cat jumped out," Gibson said, adding that a rescue team removed "a significant amount of rubble to be 100 percent" certain that no person was trapped inside.

Police have said up to 120 bodies may be entombed in the ruins of the downtown CTV building alone, where dozens of foreign students from an international school were believed trapped.

"I talked to experts who say we've worked on buildings like this overseas and we get miracles. New Zealand deserves a few miracles," he said.

The King's Education language school released a list of missing people presumed in the building: nine teachers and 51 students — 26 Japanese, 14 Chinese, six Filipinos, three Thais, one South Korean and one Czech. An additional 20 students were listed with "status unknown."

The death toll rose Saturday to 145 after additional bodies were pulled from wrecked buildings, Police Superintendent David Cliff said. More than 200 people remain missing, he said.

At Christchurch's iconic cathedral, workers had just begun work on its ruined bell tower late Friday when fresh aftershocks sent more masonry tumbling from the building.

Mark Baker
/
AP

Crews inspect the damaged Pyne Gould Corporation building in Christchurch.

Rescuers were immediately withdrawn while the safety of the 130-year old church was reassessed and a new plan made to reach as many as 22 people who may be entombed inside.

The city's central business district will take several months to recover, Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee said, adding that "most of the services, in fact all of the services that are offered in the CBD will need to relocate elsewhere."

Damaged buildings will need to be bulldozed and rebuilt "so that people can have confidence about coming back into the area to transact any business that's here."

One in three of the central city's mostly brick buildings were severely damaged in the quake and must be demolished, earthquake engineer Jason Ingham said.

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Grant Smith, second from left, is assisted as he walks behind the coffin of his 9-month-old son, Jayden Harris, in Christchurch, New Zealand, on March 2. Jayden was killed on Feb. 22 when a 6.3 magnitude earthquake hit Christchurch.
(Mark Mitchell / New Zealand Herald via AP)
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People battle high winds and dust in Christchurch on March 1, as the silt caused from soil liquefaction after the quake dried out.
(Brett Phibbs / New Zealand Herald via AP)
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Urban Search and Rescue workers from Japan, New Zealand, China and Australia at Cathedral Square observe two minutes of silence at 12.51pm local time to mark the time of last week's Christchurch earthquake, March 1.
(Cameron Spencer / Getty Images)
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Students work in the suburb of Shirley to clear away silt caused as a result of liquefaction on March 1 in Christchurch, New Zealand.
(Phil Walter / Getty Images)
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Mourners at the funeral for Joe Pohio follow the casket to the Kaiti Atua Cemetery for a burial service on March 1 in Kaiapoi, New Zealand. Joe Pohio was killed from falling debris after coming to the aid of a woman in the Christchurch City Food Court after the earthquake struck.
(Phil Walter / Getty Images)
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Rev. Philip Robinson holds a service outside the St. Barnabas Church in Christchurch, New Zealand, Sunday, Feb. 27, 2011. The church sustained minor damage after a 6.3 magnitude earthquake hit the city Tuesday, Feb 22.
(Rob Griffith / AP)
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Ray Shearman takes a break from cleaning the silt from his yard in the suburb of Bexley on Feb. 26, in Christchurch, New Zealand.
(Cameron Spencer / Getty Images)
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Brent Smith and his family watch as their earthquake-damaged house is demolished in Christchurch, Saturday, Feb. 26. Violent aftershocks from the Feb. 22 magnitude-6.3 quake hampered desperate efforts to find survivors.
(Tim Wimborne / Reuters)
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Newlyweds Emma Howard and Chris Greenslade cheer for a group photo after their wedding on Friday, just days after she was pulled from the rubble of the earthquake devastated Pyne Gould Corporation in Christchurch.
(Mark Baker / AP)
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A car lies buried by rubble on Friday in the port town of Lyttelton, which was the epicenter of the 6.3 earthquake.
(Torsten Blackwood / AFP - Getty Images)
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Debrah Moore and her children gather in front of their tent after their house was made unliveable by Tuesday's earthquake, in a beach-side suburb of Christchurch on Friday.
(Tim Wimborne / Reuters)
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Relatives of missing Japanese students walk to a bus after arriving at Christchurch airport on Feb. 25. Many Japanese students of an international English language school are still unaccounted for after the quake.
(Mark Baker / AP)
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Members of Canterbury University volunteer army clean up mud on Feb. 24 in Christchurch. The quake caused liquefaction of the ground.
(Martin Hunter / Getty Images)
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Members of the Japan Disaster Relief Team line up as they board their flight to New Zealand at Narita international airport east of Tokyo on Feb. 23.
(Toru Hanai / Reuters)
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A rescue worker uses a thermal imaging camera to search for signs of life in the Pyne Gould Guinness building in central Christchurch on Wednesday.
(Simon Baker / Reuters)
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An aerial view of emergency services people working at the ruined CTV building in central Christchurch Wednesday. Search teams used their bare hands, dogs, heavy cranes and earth movers to pull survivors from the rubble of Tuesday's powerful earthquake.
(Sarah Ivey / AP)
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Fifteen-year-old Kent Manning, left, and his sister Libby, 18, pictured with their father, who asked not to identified, after they were told by police on Wednesday that there was no hope of finding Kent and Libby's mother alive in the collapsed CTV building.
(Rob Griffith / AP)
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A fuel tanker sits abandoned and blocked by fallen rubble on a main road between Lyttelton Township and Christchurch on Wednesday.
(Sarah Ivey / AP)
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The Timeball Station is seen to be badly damaged, a day after the 6.3-magnitude earthquake in the township of Lyttelton near Christchurch on Wednesday.
(Sarah Ivey / AP)
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A vehicle is stuck in liquification in a street after a magnitude 6.3 earthquake in Christchurch on Wednesday.
(Dianne Manson / EPA)
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Icebergs caved into Tasman Lake as a result of the 6.3 earthquake on Tuesday. The New Zealand Herald newspaper reported that 30 million tons of ice broke free from the Tasman Glacier in Aoraki Mt Cook National Park.
(Reuters)
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